Acquainted with the Night

Robert Frost's Acquainted with the Night was another deeply depressing poem. Frost presents an extended metaphor over the entire poem. He parallel's the speaker's misery and loneliness with the night time. There is obviously a strong resemblance there with that emotion. "I have looked down the saddest city lane" (Frost, 976). The speaker has hit rock bottom in terms of depression. "dropped my eyes, unwilling to explain" (Frost, 976). The speaker has done something that he is ashamed of that quite possibly could have led to his solitude. Although he is unable to interact with others, the poem offers a sense that the speaker wanted to escape this terrible lonely life he was in. He felt almost jealous that no one called out to him.The poem has a lot of repetition. Many of the lines start with "I have." The poem even ends with the same line as it began with. This fact expresses a sort of cyclical pattern in the speaker's life. The speaker seems to have forced himself into a lonely, miserable cycle that he can't get out of. The poem is written without any symbols of hope or redemption.